the beam reflected back
from an eye,--as an eye it seemed watchful and steadfast through the
dark; it shot along the floor,--it fell at the foot of the bed.

Suddenly, in the exceeding hush, there was a strange and ghastly
sound,--it was the howl of a dog! Helen started from her sleep.
Percival's dog had followed her into her room; it had coiled itself,
grateful for the kindness, at the foot of the bed. Now it was on the
pillow, she felt its heart beat against her hand,--it was trembling; its
hairs bristled up, and the howl changed into a shrill bark of terror and
wrath. Alarmed, she looked round; quickly between her and that ray
from the crevice a shapeless darkness passed, and was gone, so
undistinguishable, so without outline, that it had no likeness of any
living form; like a cloud, like a thought, like an omen, it came in
gloom, and it vanished.

Helen was seized with a superstitious terror; the dog continued to
tremble and growl low. All once more was still; the dog sighed itself
to rest. The stillness, the solitude, the glimmer of the moon,--all
contributed yet more to appall the enfeebled nerves of the listening,
shrinking girl. At length she buried her face under the clothes, and
towards daybreak fell into a broken, feverish sleep, haunted with
threatening dreams.

CHAPTER XXV. THE MESSENGER SPEEDS.

Towards the afternoon of the following day, an elderly gentleman was
seated in the coffee-room of an hotel at Southampton, engaged in writing
a letter, while the waiter in attendance was employed on the wires
that fettered the petulant spirit contained in a bottle of Schweppe's
soda-water. There was something in the aspect of the old gentleman, and
in the very tone of his voice, that inspired respect, and the waiter had
cleared the other tables of their latest newspapers to place before
him. He had only just arrived by the packet from Havre, and even the
newspapers had not been to him that primary attraction they generally
constitute to the Englishman returning to his bustling native land,
which, somewhat to his surprise, has contrived to go on tolerably well
during his absence.

We use our privilege of looking over his shoulder while he writes:--

Here I am, then, dear Lady Mary, at Southampton, and within an easy
drive of the old Hall. A file of Galignani's journals, which I found on
the road between Marseilles and Paris, informed me, under the head of
"fashionable movements," that Percival St. John,